Ekali @ The Catalyst 10/14/18 Show Review by Josh aka DJ iEHOA

Nathan Shaw better known as Ekali took over the Catalyst on October 14. Ekali is a producer from Vancouver, Canada. He has produced tracks in various genres such as house, trap and future bass. Ekali has also collaborated with different artists such as Drake, Denzel Curry, and ZHU.

Ekali visits Santa Cruz on his tour to support his EP “Crystal Eyes” released last month.

The show first opened up with a DJ named Fishy who kept the vibe and crowd really mellow. After Fishy we are treated with a young producer at the age of 16 that goes by Jaron. Jaron set was full of energy with the crowd feeling the future bass within. Being able to go on tour at the age of 16 must of felt like a dream for him and everyone there was able to live it with him. One of the most memorable songs from him that night is his remix of San Holo’s, “lift me from the ground”. After Jaron, we have 1788-L which has only been around for less than a year. Even though he has not been around for long, he has already been taking over the world most recently in signing under the Deadbeats label by Zeds Dead. He brought the heat with his music, but for me, this was a low point for the show. As the crowd started to grow many of the individuals in the crowd started to not respect the space of those around them. I was struggling to deal with unnecessary pushing and shoving by people either not caring about the space around them or wanting to go to a spot which did not have any space.

When 1788-L was over the crowd had a few minutes to rest up which helped calmed the crowd down. This is where we finally get to welcome Ekali to the stage which started off with a bang. The heavy bass of dubstep took over the crowd for the first 15 minutes until he started to go back to the trap sounds that he is known for. He played many mashups of artists such as Post Malone and Sheck Wes. He played my favorite mashup as of recent SICKOMODE/HEX.

While he was able to put on a good show with his trap sound one huge let down for me was the fact that he did not play his most popular song “Forever” on his EP. Many fans who were also at that show seemed to feel the same way as I did as we voiced our disappointment at the end of the show.

Overall I give this show a 6/9★★★★★★✩✩✩ on my scale.

Even though the music was great throughout the night, the struggle of trying to tolerate the crowd and him not playing “Forever” is something I will not forgive.